On September 28, 2025, Moldovans will head to the parliamentary elections that will shape the country’s strategic orientation and its role in the region. Moldova’s parliamentary system is a unicameral legislature comprising 101 seats, all of which are contested in national elections.
This vote is more than just a routine exercise in democracy. It is cast as a contest between pro-European forces advocating deeper integration with the European Union and pro-Russian actors seeking to reassert Moscow’s influence.
Roughly 3.3 million Moldovans are eligible to vote this year, and the diaspora will once again play a decisive role. With over 800,000 qualified voters abroad, nearly a quarter of the electorate, the Central Election Commission has expanded the number of polling stations overseas to 301, compared to 234 in the 2024 presidential election.
The stakes are particularly high because Moldova remains caught between two very different versions of the future. President Maia Sandu and her Party of Action and Solidarity have pursued reforms aimed at closer European Union integration, emphasizing the rule of law, judicial independence, anti-corruption, economic stability, energy security, and resilience against Russian influence.
Meanwhile, Russia continues to wield hybrid threats, economic pressure, disinformation campaigns, and the unresolved Transnistrian conflict to limit Moldova’s sovereignty and shape its political and strategic landscape.
Tensions overshadow campaign
In the run-up to the elections, the campaign was overshadowed by a flurry of legal actions, allegations of electoral fraud, and fears of foreign interference. Two days before voting, the Central Election Commission barred two pro-Russian parties, Heart of Moldova (PRIM) and Moldova Mare (PMM), following court rulings that restricted their activities for a year due to illegal financing, suspected voter bribery, and links to previously banned organizations tied to fugitive oligarch Ilan Shor.
In the preceding days, authorities carried out around 250 raids across more than 100 localities, detaining 74 people for up to 72 hours in connection with an alleged Russia-backed plan to provoke mass destabilization.
On 24 September, Chișinău police discovered 200 ballots for the Alternative bloc in a printing shop, allegedly intended for a “carousel” voting fraud scheme. The Alternative leaders claimed the ballots were campaign models, but the Central Electoral Commission ruled they violated publicity laws, as they closely resembled official ballots.
A day later, Moldovans have witnessed the extradition of fugitive oligarch Vladimir Plahotniuc from Greece to face charges related to the 2014 “theft of the century,” in which roughly $1 billion (about 12% of the country’s GDP) was stolen from Moldova’s banking system.
Plahotniuc, former leader of the Democratic Party of Moldova, had been on the run since 2019 and was arrested in July 2025 in Athens while reportedly carrying 16 forged passports.
Upon arrival in Chisinau, he was placed in solitary confinement and was scheduled to face multiple criminal charges, including fraud, money laundering, and managing a criminal organization.
Moscow’s hand
The eventful week just days before Moldova’s parliamentary elections heightened the pre-election tension, with President Sandu accusing Moscow of pouring hundreds of millions of euros into Moldova to incite violence, spread disinformation, and sow fear. This is not new.
In the 2024 Moldovan presidential elections, Russian actors conducted a wide-ranging campaign of interference aimed at undermining the reelection of pro-Western President Maia Sandu and blocking Moldova’s potential alignment with the European Union.
According to reports, a disinformation campaign using Telegram chatbots, fake news sites, forged government letters, and social media ads to spread anti-EU messages, incentivize voter manipulation, and undermine President Maia Sandu, reportedly funneling over $15 million to around 130,000 citizens to influence public opinion and weaken trust in Moldova’s institutions.
Russia went to extraordinary lengths to influence the 2025 Moldovan elections, too. The Kremlin has utilized a combination of financial, cyber, and political tactics. Reports indicate that Russian-linked actors have funneled significant funds into vote-buying, bribery schemes, and protest mobilization, while coordinated disinformation campaigns, including anti-EU campaigns, deepfakes, and fabricated polls, were spreading online to undermine trust in the pro-European government. At the same time, Moldova’s energy vulnerabilities following the 2024 gas transit deal expiration have been exploited to increase public discontent.
Remember Georgia
The elections in Moldova suddenly cast Georgia, which had been languishing in the outer periphery of European attention, into unexpected and unenviable limelight.
In 2024, Georgia also held critical parliamentary elections that would shape the country’s trajectory. Despite a predominantly pro-EU population hoping for democratic renewal and closer integration with Europe alongside Moldova and Ukraine, the elections ultimately reinforced Moscow’s influence.
The widespread anti-Russian protests in the capital months before the vote were insufficient to prevent yet another consolidation of Kremlin-aligned authorities in the country. The nearly year-long nonstop rallies and protests across the country ensured that while the present is grim, the future remains uncertain, and therefore still holds hope.
But Georgia’s failures offer a stark lesson for Moldova: yielding to Russian influence even under the pretext of reducing tensions can rapidly undermine sovereignty, rewire the economy, and quickly curb the democratic freedoms that may seem guaranteed. In 2012, the Georgian people brought Moscow-bred oligarch Bidzina Ivanishvili and his Georgian Dream party to power. Since then, the party has retained its grip on power and captured state institutions, largely ignoring popular discontent, scolding from Brussels, and a lack of international legitimacy.
The gradual but relentless capture of institutions, all the while claiming its “pro-European” credentials, allowed the Georgian Dream to ram through Kremlin-style laws that restricted and punished civil society, drowned out independent media in a deluge of state-sponsored propaganda, and reshaped domestic politics in ways that obstructed European integration.
Moldova’s internal divisions and proximity to the European Union have prevented Moscow from gaining complete control. Moscow’s efforts to influence elections are part of a broader, long-standing strategy aimed at preserving its leverage. Now, this strategy has been retooled with Georgian experience.
Each electoral cycle presents the Kremlin with an opportunity to adapt tactics previously deployed in countries such as Ukraine, Georgia, and Romania, utilizing both overt and covert mechanisms to slow or block European integration and potential security options outside Moscow’s sphere of influence.
Central to this influence is Russia’s control over the pro-Russian breakaway region of Transnistria and the existence of the political forces on its payroll. Leveraging these tools, Moscow can shape domestic policy, constrain foreign partnerships, and project power toward NATO member Romania and Ukraine.
For Moldova, the 2025 parliamentary elections will be a crucial test of the country’s ability to maintain sovereignty and advance its democratic trajectory. The Georgian experience shows that the domination of pro-Russian forces in parliament could rapidly close off the country’s prospects for EU integration through the rapid deployment of now-standard policies, such as Kremlin-style restrictive laws. The lesson from Georgia shows the stakes are high: once pro-Russian forces consolidate their hold on power, it is hard to reverse the effects on democratic institutions, freedoms, and pro-Western strategic alignment.
These elections will also be a test of the European Union’s ability to use its leverage. In contrast to Georgia, Moldova (including Transnistria) is now significantly more linked with the EU markets and has a pro-European diaspora that can vote freely. This gives Europe considerable influence. The elections tomorrow will thus serve as a critical test for the EU’s ability to wield this leverage without undermining Moldova’s democratic credentials. The European capitals, Brussels, and the Sandu government must prove that the EU is capable of supporting candidate countries, safeguarding its enlargement agenda, and navigating broader geopolitical shifts.
